My RPX 25 Video- Is It Really That Bad?

braxus

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I have been posting simple videos on some films I have used in the past. I posted one about RPX 25 in May, since there aren't many videos about it at all on Youtube. I don't go into depth with my videos, as I just show the results I got myself and let the viewer make up their own mind on it. My results weren't meant to be definative, but just ballpark results.

Anyway I get this snotty response (Im guessing from a spoiled Millenial) on my comments section. It said-
Linjica Konikon commented: "Lousy photography and lousy music and boring camera work on the video. Something tells me the film isn't the problem."

Now he didnt give any criticism for how I could make it better, he just insisted on crapping on my video. His attitude really sucked as far as Im concerned.

I'll post a link to the video for you guys to comment on. I dont make flashy videos, as Im just a one man band and I hate pointing cameras on sticks at myself out in public. I just keep it simple. What do you think I could do to improve what I have? Should I take more photos and add to the video with more results? Does this kid have a point or is he just being entitled with a bad attitude?

MODERATOR'S EDIT:
The original YouTube link, that was here, related to a video that has been removed by braxus from YouTube.
The discussion that follows in posts 2-27 refers to that earlier version of the video.
See post #28 for the link to the new version of braxus' video.
 
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eddie

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Responses are usually worth what the commenter is paying for them, which is nothing.
I do think the music is distracting, and makes it harder to hear you.
 

radiant

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I took a quick look at the video and I can say straight away that music in the background isn't the best choice and makes it difficult to hear what you speak. I would drop the music from talking head scenes. Also consider some other music genre for next ones.
 
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braxus

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Ok. The music could be toned down or taken off completely. I tried to balance the music in the background so it isn't overpowering, but maybe it needs to be tweaked a bit more? Im just using my cell phone for the video camera, since I sold off all my good camera gear 3 months ago. Im in-between systems at the moment. So the mic on the cell phone isn't great.

The music- I had to find royalty free music, so choices are limited in what I can use in the video. I'll examine to see if there is a better choice.
 
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eddie

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I agree with vedostuu about getting rid of the music when you're on camera and speaking. For the part you're showing images, acoustic, without drums, would be less distracting.
 
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braxus

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Andrew- No music for the picture section?

Can anyone comment on the pictures used? Commenter said the ones used were lousy. I dont think they are that bad, but I find the point moot as this isn't a photo contest, but just to show what the film looks like.
 

MattKing

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I found it interesting, but I have some observations.
I too find the music to be challenging at best.
If I were to choose music, I would probably choose something quieter and in a minor key.
A jazz quartet playing something quiet and contemplative comes to mind.
The photographs are nice, but I wonder about three things:
1) there are a lot of them, and I'm not sure that the quantity is useful for the purpose, because there is a fair amount of tonal similarity between many of them;
2) on my screen, the scans appear fairly flat - not a lot of power or impact from the shadows, and not a lot of brilliance to the highlights;
3) there are no people in any of the examples. I too don't often show people shots, but when evaluating a film, a lot of photographers want to see how it behaves when photographing people.
A larger on-screen image of the film box would be a good idea - particularly for those who will be viewing this on their phone!
For the relatively lengthy portions of the video where you are talking to the camera, it would be good if you broke them up visually a bit. Some shots of prints in your hands or loading the film into a camera or some other visual variety would help to add some flow.
Hope this helps.
And I do applaud you for doing this.
 

radiant

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braxus said:
Can anyone comment on the pictures used? Commenter said the ones used were lousy. I dont think they are that bad, but I find the point moot as this isn't a photo contest, but just to show what the film looks like.
Click to expand...

Why are you worried about single commenter or internetz? I think you have to seek into yourself to find answer on this topic.
 

pentaxuser

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All I could see in the comments was one that was OK. Were you able to remove the nasty one because that is was what it clearly was - a troll comment if ever I saw one. I think that a few seconds of music intro is fine. In fact a number of presenters actually have their own theme music but no music while you speak It just interferes. Less strident music might help as well What I have always found useful is written comments underneath about dev, film speed etc talking and writing can reinforce the message.

I liked your delivery with no histrionics, funny hand gestures, hip phrases etc and speech speed was OK, if a little quick There is a tendency to speak too fast in some videos What can sound to you like a laboured speech as you deliver it, is in fact the right speed for listeners. This can be one of the most difficult things to master but it is worth practising.

This will sound trite as it's the standard advice that is always given but it is worth asking yourself what would you want to hear and see about RPX25 if you were the viewer. I always think it is worth imagining you are speaking to a good friend who is about to buy/do whatever it is that you are presenting and has about 10 mins to spare to listen and understand the stuff he really needs to know

Finally and I appreciate this applies to fewer and fewer of us as time goes by but as a darkroom printer and not a scanner it is always worth knowing what adjustments were made to the scans I'd prefer little or no adjustments so the "prints" are similar to what I might achieve as a straight print in the darkroom or alternatively show the negatives as they are as well.

Keep going. No-one is a polished presenter from the start and everyone gets better at this kind of thing

Not a bad start at all would be my verdict

pentaxuser
 

Adrian Bacon

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I've been a long time content broadcaster in various mediums on the internet. The thing to keep in mind is there is always going to be someone who is going to say something to try to get a rise out of you. This is the Internet after all, if you didn’t ask them for feedback, you can safely ignore comments.

that being said, often, simple, is better when conveying information. There’s rarely a need to do anything fancy unless it’s in service of what you’re trying to convey. Be ruthless when cutting. If it doesn’t help, get rid of it, or do something different. A lot of people lose sight of the point of creating and posting pictures, audio (like podcasts), and video (like YouTube) and get into trying to be fancy or try to do broadcast like things, which often comes across as cheesy because YouTube is not broadcast TV.

at the end of the day, content is king. Often when you see people getting fancy with camera work or angles, or visual effects, it’s because their content sucks and that’s the only way they can keep people watching. If your content has a defined purpose and you can execute and convey that in a clean simple straightforward way, you’ll be fine.

If it’s not in service of the point of the video, be ruthless about it and lose it.
 

DMJ

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Most people watching videos on YouTube look for videos that are well produced. Meaning that if the goal is to communicate, the communication channel should be clear and without noise in semiological terms. In most of your video you are standing in front of the camera talking to your audience, so the goal is to verbally communicate your content. Using a teleprompter or other aids is good but the script needs to be rehearsed anyway. It is ok to have music in the background but the levels (compared to your voice) in your video are too high and because the quality of the audio is not optimal there is a lot of interference between the music and speech. You could use a lavalier mic or a microphone with a cardioid/shotgun pattern to filter unwanted noise from the sides. There are also techniques to equalize the music so it doesn't interfere with speech. Lighting is another topic and given that you are a photographer I assume you know how to improve that. I've done and do sound and music for films and one of the causes of instant rejections in film festivals is bad sound.

Cheers
 
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braxus

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Some really good and valid points guys. Thank you.

vedostuu said:
Why are you worried about single commenter or internetz? I think you have to seek into yourself to find answer on this topic.
Click to expand...

Because my aim is to produce videos that are useful with good content and of reasonable quality. If someone shoots it down, I have to evaluate what they say is legit or not. This is why I posted this thread. Im trying to improve things to make it of better quality, so I dont get jerks like that trolling, posting comments like he did. I had to examine this video to see what needed fixing on it.

pentaxuser said:
All I could see in the comments was one that was OK. Were you able to remove the nasty one because that is was what it clearly was - a troll comment if ever I saw one.
Click to expand...

I commented on it first, but then removed the whole thing. I wasn't going to feed him in afterthought. I also dont really think it was a fair comment to post, since there was no info on how to improve. He was basically just crapping on it all. So I didnt want that showing.

I ended up shooting another roll of RPX 25 and have a 4th one loaded to use soon. I'll get some more sample pictures, so I get some more variety and pick the best ones to show. I'll redo the video and add the content. I'll probably end up re-recording the message portion.
 
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Sal Santamaura

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My only comment concerns the title of this thread. I though you'd made a video about Agfapan 25, a.k.a. APX25. Instead your production concerns a Rollei-branded film.
 

Bill Burk

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I subscribed. Photos are great . Can’t wait for more
 
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braxus

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Thanks Bill. There are other older videos in my channel. I'm working on redoing this video. Maybe tomorrow evening it might be up?
 

Adrian Bacon

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braxus said:
Thanks Bill. There are other older videos in my channel. I'm working on redoing this video. Maybe tomorrow evening it might be up?
Click to expand...

Aside from the sound issues that others noted, the only other real thing I'd offer is maybe consider doing a slight Ken Burns effect on the photos. It doesn't have to be super obvious, but doing so does generally immensely improves the watchability, which does serve the purpose of the video. I don't know what video editor you use, but if you're in Adobe Premiere Pro, drop each photo into a dedicated sequence, make it however many seconds long you want that photo to show, then go into the effects panel, start at the beginning of the sequence and set the zoom so that it mostly fills the frame, then go to the end of the sequence and set the zoom so that it is ~5% more zoomed in, or to taste, whichever you prefer. How long the sequence is will effect that.

From there, just drop the image sequences into your main video assembly sequence in the order that you want the images to display and you'll have a nice image slideshow with that ken burns effect, and if you want to reuse them as B-Roll to fill the screen as you talk, you can reuse them without having to re-do the effect since they're a sequence that you can just drop into the timeline of any other sequence.
 
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braxus

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Im not sure what a Ken Burns affect is, but it sounds like after 5 seconds, it zooms in a little before the next picture. I use Adobe Premiere Elements. Its limited on the affects you can do. Transitions could also work, but cut into the time the picture is on screen. I'll have to rewatch the old video to see exactly what I said about the film, so I can refilm the talking parts with updates.

I mixed up a fresh batch of Xtol tonight and its in my wine bag now cooling down. Should be ready for my rolls tomorrow. I still have to shoot that final roll in the morning, and get my 2 new rolls developed and scanned. I'll check the scans off the older rolls and see if I can fix the flat look of the film. I did mention this film is rather limited in its tones, so getting it to look better without F'ing things up too much is a trick. I have another video I have to make up as well, as I deleted one of them because of an issue with the store it was about. So I have to fill in that one too. All my videos are similar that I used music throughout. I'll have to change that going forward.
 

Alan Johnson

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(1) Music, have a job to hear you.
(2) Missed that the resolution of Aviphot 80 is 287/101 lppm at contrast 1000:1 and 1.6:1, this is higher than 100 T-Max
Wasted this resolution by shooting in Medium Format, you will never see it with a MF scanner.
https://www.agfa.com/specialty-products/wp-content/uploads/sites/8/2017/06/AVIPHOT-PAN-80.pdf
(3) No mention that the need to shoot at EI 25 is to attempt to straighten the S curve of Aviphot 80.
(4) Complain about flat mid tones, your mistake, develop for longer on dull days.
(5) You can buy an old Lumix GH-2 that takes a plug in mic quite cheaply.
 

Adrian Bacon

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Burns_effect
 
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braxus

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I'll take note of your comments. I still have two rolls to develop and scan, so I'll see if anything changes.
 

Bill Burk

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The videos I enjoy most of people's black and white pictures is when they sit at a desk or coffee table and leaf through real prints, the interviewer picks one up shows to the photographer and asks them about it (or photgrapher picks it up to share what they feel about it). A video I recently saw that I love is the one of Andreas Feininger where he shows the fake beach setup with sand and shells. Then he picks up a shell to show it and then the photo of that shell.
 

Nicholas Lindan

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I just started looking at this series from the BBC: In addition to Feininger there are show & tell interviews with Adams, Lartigue, Kertesz, Eisenstaed, Brandt....

When I was young we lived across the creek from the county library. The library had a large photography collection (gone now) and Feininger's books were what I started on (after I had discarded the librarian's suggestion of "The Boy's Big Book of Photography" as being better suited for the 8-year old boy that I was - proud possessor of an Empire Baby with its Optical Crystal Lens, a lens so bad it would make a Diana blush).

Oh, dear, I can feel a BBC binge coming on: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCCj0MNC-iOI-S6IUoBIJcw

* * *
​
As to the OP, well, I am afraid my answer is 'yes.' Watch the above. Cut the music - NO music. Don't just parade the photos - nobody cares. Talk about what you find significant about the photos, how the film brought out your vision - or trashed it, for that matter. If you don't have a vision to talk about then don't show that photo.
 
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